The
State Cattle Association divided the entire State range into a
number of round-up districts. Under an elected round-up captain
were all the bosses in charge of the different ranch outfits sent
by men having cattle in the round-up. Let us briefly draw a
picture of this scene as it was.
Each cowboy would have eight or ten horses for his own use, for
he had now before him the hardest riding of the year. When the
cow-puncher went into the herd to cut out calves he mounted a
fresh horse, and every few hours he again changed horses, for
there was no horse which could long endure the fatigue of the
rapid and intense work of cutting. Before the rider stretched a
sea of interwoven horns, waving and whirling as the densely
packed ranks of cattle closed in or swayed apart. It was no
prospect for a weakling, but into it went the cow-puncher on his
determined little horse, heeding not the plunging, crushing, and
thrusting of the excited cattle. Down under the bulks of the
herd, half hid in the whirl of dust, he would spy a little curly
calf running, dodging, and twisting, always at the heels of its
mother; and he would dart in after, following the two through the
thick of surging and plunging beasts.
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